Prince's personal salute to injured soldiers' champion from Gresford

A LIONHEART has received the congratulations of Prince Harry after being honoured in the Queen’s Birthday Honours List.

Martin Colclough, originally of Gresford, received a letter from the prince after being awarded an OBE.

Mr Colclough works closely with Prince Harry supporting wounded soldiers with the Help for Heroes veterans’ charity and the Queen’s grandson wrote to Mr Colclough congratulating him on his honour, which was granted for services to disability sport in the armed services.

The 53-year-old, who is head of sports recovery for Help for Heroes at Tedworth House, Wiltshire, joined the armed forces aged 16 after leaving Darland High School in Rossett.

His father, Derek, 76, who lives on Chester Road, Acton, with wife Karen, spoke of his “immense pride” on hearing the news.

“Such is the way of the world these days, I’d actually read on Facebook that Martin had been given an OBE on Saturday morning, before he was able to call us,” he said.

“When he rang up, it filled us all with immense pride and it is fantastic recognition for all his hard work and support for injured servicemen.”

Mr Colclough entered the Parachute Regiment at 18, becoming a physical training instructor and eventually rising to the rank of major.

He left the armed forces at the age of 50 after a 34-year career and began working with injured soldiers as head of rehabilitation at the Headley Court defence medical centre in Surrey.

His worked led him to cross paths with Prince Harry, who is a key figure in the work of Help for Heroes and disabled sport in the armed forces.

The two men are currently involved in organising up a team of disabled ex-soldiers for the Invictus Games, a Paralympic-style multi-sport event for wounded, injured and sick servicemen and women

Mr Colclough also helps run Battle Back, an adaptive adventure training and sports rehabilitation programme to help the seriously wounded.

Derek Colclough added: “Prince Harry is deeply involved with helping injured service personnel and works closely with Martin.

“For him to write to him passing on his congratulations for the honour was a really nice touch.

“The work they do really is terrific and they do an awful lot of work for those disabled servicemen.”